The Ultimate Peanut Butter Cookie Showdown!

My friend and I got together, to come up with the ultimate, Deliciously Healthy, peanut butter cookies!

After some trial and error, a lot of math, and creative thinking, we got it!

Naturally Peanut Butter Cookies!If you can believe it, I've never actually had peanut butter cookies...or at least not that I can remember. I was loyal to the classic, chocolate chip cookie.

So, after we had made the winning batch of low-fat peanut butter cookies, my friend told me that I couldn't really know if our recipe compared to the original, until I actually tried the original (fattening) version.

Now, what you have to know about my friend, is that she is like, the peanut butter cookie queen! She LOVES them!

Her point made sense, so with a nod of my head, she went into her kitchen, and pulled out all the ingredients to make HER recipe. The recipe that she loved (That's key to remember;)

She got kinda giddy as she pulled out the ingredients. I could tell she was excited to make/dig into her favorite peanut butter cookies!

Her recipe, called for 1/2 a cup of butter, and 1/2 a cup of peanut butter. Along with some other changes.

When they were done baking, we sat down to do our taste test.

My friend went back and forth, between the original peanut butter cookie, and our naturally PB cookie. Finally she looked up, with an almost confused look on her face, and said "You know, there really isn't that big of a difference"
The fact that the naturally PB cookie, satisfied her just as much as her favorite peanut butter cookie recipe, was a sweet victory for me!

Another thing she said, that was music to my ears, was that she felt she could serve these cookies to guests, and they totally wouldn't know that they were low-fat!

After our taste test, we put a naturally peanut butter cookie, and her original peanut butter cookie, on a napkin, and let them sit for a little while:Can you see the difference between the grease mark left by the original peanut butter cookie, and our naturally peanut butter cookie?
That's insane. And kinda gross.

When I came home, I had my husband do a taste test, not telling him that one was healthy, and one wasn't. He took a bite of the the original, took a sip of milk, and then took a bite of the healthy peanut butter cookie. No joke, he lifted up the hand with the unhealthy cookie in it, and said, "This one's gross!" He then proceeded to eat almost all the naturally peanut butter cookies! I only have one left!
Guess I'm going to have to make another batch!

So the verdict? Our recipe has 75% less peanut butter, and 50% less butter, and it's pretty much the same yummy, peanut buttery cookie!!
And in mine, and my husband's opinion, it's the better cookie!

Don't believe me?
Try it for yourself!

Naturally Peanut Butter Cookies:
This is What you Need:

• 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup oatmeal flour (Pour oatmeal into a blender, and pulse until it's a fine consistency)
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 1 large egg
• 3 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 cup packed dark brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons of Skippy Natural peanut butter. (My friend introduced me to this PB, and it's seriously good! The only ingredients are: Roasted peanuts, sugar, palm oil, and salt!)
• 1/4 cup dry-roasted salted peanuts chopped coarse

**Note: I think the natural PB is what makes this recipe taste so... good! I definitely recommend using an all natural PB.

This is What You Do:

• Pre-heat to 350.
• Whisk flour, oatmeal flour, baking soda, and salt into medium bowl and set aside.
• Whisk butter, egg, and vanilla extract into large bowl. Then stir in brown sugar, peanut butter, and chopped peanuts. Stir until smooth.
  
• Stir in flour mixture and combine.
• Roll level tablespoons of dough into 1 inch balls and place 2 1/2 inches apart on sheet.
• Bake cookies one cookie sheet at a time for 11-13 minutes or until edges are golden brown and centers are set.
• Cool for 5 minutes

Enjoy!!

Here's what I'm thinking:
Calories: 90
for 1 yummy cookie

***

On a side note, My weigh in was yesterday. My lack of a post yesterday, pretty much explains how I feel about it. I was 180, which means I didn't lose any weight this week.

When I've gone on a diet in the past, I always stopped at the 180 mark. For some reason, whenever I'd get to this point, I'd choose the cheese pizza, over the salad....

So, this leads me to believe that I've hit a plateau. My body is used to me giving up at this point, and it hasn't been past this point in a while.

The nice thing about this is, I know that this is going to be the time I get past the 180 mark!! I'm going to make a few changes to shake things up a bit, and I will get into the 170's! I just have to get past this little plateau first ;D